T-Pain Vows To Put Auto-Tone On Permanent Lock-Down

It's like Superman without his cape, or Flavor Flav without the giant clock. Run-DMC without their Adidas and Kangols, the SW1's without their berets and military gear or Lil Wayne without his braids.

Some things in hip-hop just don't go. Just don't tell T-Pain, because on Thursday (June 2) the "King of the Ringtone" vowed that he was putting up the Auto-Tune for good and never again using the voice-distorting studio trick that made him a Grammy winning superstar.

"I'm done with Auto-Tune," Teddy Pain said in a statement that surely made Jay-Z smile. "I vow right here, right now, to never use Auto-Tune again. I'm onto something that I think is bigger and better called The T-Pain Effect.”

Pain famously defended the use of the sound that became ubiquitous on everything from tunes by Lil Wayne to Rebecca Black and dancehall star Mavado over the past five years.

But now he says he's hooked up with the audio technology company iZotope on "Effect," which he did not describe, but which sounds like a new kind of vocal processing program. Pain's new album, rEVOLVEr is due out in the fall.

What do you think of T-Pain retiring his use of Auto-Tune? leave a comment below.